Franklin on Final Drive of First Half

Let’s take one last look at the final Maryland drive of the first half against Middle Tennessee State, through the eyes of offensive coordinator James Franklin. It looked like Maryland wasted some valuable time in the final minute of the half. The Terps wound up not getting any points anyway and entered the locker room trailing 10-7. Before starting the drive with three minutes to play at the Maryland 17, the Terps had gone three and out three consecutive times. Not good.

Here’s Franklin: “We were trying to get the ball down in field-goal range. All we wanted to do was get some points. We started the drive with three minutes, and that is when Josh [Portis] picked up the critical third down. Once again, we were not making some of throws that I thought we had to, so we were just going to do whatever we had to get first downs and put us in position to hopefully kick a field goal and leave with something positive. If we get a touchdown, great; but just try to get first downs. We had some three-and-outs in the first half that put our defense in a tough situation.

“Two things happened. We scored real fast in the game, and the defense was on the field for a long time and then they had to go back on the field. Although you don’t want to say we don’t want to take the points. And then we had three three and outs. To me, a three and out is one of the worst things you can do. As a quarterback, the way you are evaluated is third down, two-minute offense, red-zone production and wins and losses. Those things are critical. We have to do a better job with all of those things.”

(In a two-minute situation, is it tough to shuffle quarterbacks?)
“What I was mentioning was that we were not running a two-minute situation. We had three and outs up to that point, running a normal offense. I didn’t feel we could drop back and consistently make the throws we needed to. All I was trying to do was do what I can to consistently make first downs. And hopefully put us in position to score a touchdown or kick a field goal.”